At Parish Taceaux, an Urban Taqueria with a Southern Accent

Photo: An order of tacos from Parish Taceaux, including fried catfish, Nashville hot chicken and Korean BBQ tacos.

Maybe the most helpful piece of advice that anyone could give you before your first visit toParish Taceaux, the new downtown Shreveport eatery fromCadre Hospitality Group, is to not think of it as a Mexican restaurant. I don’t believe that the owners or the culinary team, including Chef Zach Schmidt, would want anyone to think that they were aiming to create authentic Mexican cuisine. Instead, they’ve created Shreveport-Bossier’s first “urban taqueria” – the kind of place where tacos come topped with everything from chow chow to chimichurri and quesadillas get stuffed with pimento cheese and duck carnitas.

Cheerwine, a South Carolina-made soda, is available at Parish Taceaux in downtown Shreveport.

If you were to distill the spirit of Parish Taceaux into one menu item, that item may be the fried catfish taco, a cornmeal-battered Louisiana catfish fillet topped with pickled green tomatoes and a tartar-like sauce. It’s like a fish fry wrapped in a tortilla, and it’s delicious. There are other Southern staples re-imagined as taco fillings here; There’s a spicy and Instagram-ready Nashville hot chicken taco with Cotija cheese and house-made pickles and a vegetarian taco with black-eyed pea hummus. Tacos are $4-$6 each and all items, including chips and salsa, are ordered à la carte. Worth noting, if you’re a fan of old school Southern sodas, is the availability of South Carolina-made Cheerwine.

Parish Taceaux is brand new to Shreveport-Bossier, having only posted regular business hours on June 30, 2016. The beautifully designed space is lit by floor-to-ceiling windows that allow the small dining room to feel at once contemporary and warm. The staff during a busy lunch visit were friendly and knowledgeable about the menu. The best part of my experience, however, was just the overall sense that this team was having a good time serving a fun, new kind of food to a crowd that’s willing to give the concept a chance. Dining out should be an adventure once in a while, as it definitely is at Parish Taceaux.

Parish Taceaux is located at 708 Texas Street in downtown Shreveport. Their current hours of operation are Tuesday through Saturday, 11 a.m. until closing (“usually around 8 p.m. or 9 p.m.”). For more information,give them a like on Facebook.